El Monte school district sex abuse, Death of Beutner's daughter, Gibbons in Santa Clairita — Saturday Edition

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Moreno Valley. Today on the LA report, the State Department of Justice announced reforms for

a local school district for mishandling sexual misconduct claims for years.

And later, how about we go on a field trip to hang out with some primates?

From day one, I was just fascinated with their song. It's just incredible powerful and emotional.

Come with me to hear the Gibbon Sing in Santa Clarita. It's Saturday, March 21st. I'm Robert

Garova. That's coming up on the weekend edition of the LA report from LAS 89.3. But first,

here's the latest news. The California Department of Justice has issued sweeping reforms for how

El Monte Union high school district will handle sexual abuse allegations against its staff.

That's after a month's long DOJ investigation that was spurred in part by an ex-Pase

published in Business Insider. It detailed decades of abuse at Rosemead High, a school in the

district. Here's Attorney General Rob Bonta, who made the announcement Friday. Our investigation

found that across multiple years, the district consistently mishandled student complaints

of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and abuse by district employees and others.

The district is required to create a compliance coordinator to manage complaints of sexual

abuse, among other things. And the LA County Medical Examiner has released the cause of death

for Emily Butner, the daughter of former LAUSD Superintendent Austin Butner. The 22-year-old died

in January from the effects of a combination of drugs, including two linked to the opioid known

as Cratum. A county health official told our partner, CBSLA, that Cratum products are sometimes

sold as natural remedies, but are illegal and unsafe. The medical examiner ruled her death

suicide after the death Butner dropped out of the LA mayoral race. If you are someone you know is

experiencing a crisis, you can always dial the mental health lifeline at 988.

And almost half of California teachers plan to leave the profession in the next 10 years.

That's according to findings published from an annual survey from the nonprofit newsroom

education week. Holly Kurtz is with the publication. She says this means a loss of decades of teaching

experience. 40% of them told us that they were going to retire in the next 10 years.

And that was one of the highest rates in the nation. The national rate was in the 30s.

Kurtz says educators are concerned California's high cost of living is making it harder to recruit

new teachers. And in Long Beach this weekend, the old city hallside is being used for extreme

skateboarding. That's where Koso, a Japanese skating game show, is making its American debut.

A group of 30 skaters will compete against one another on an obstacle course built just for the

occasion. Here's John Donigan city hall reporter for the Long Beach Post past a couple of weeks.

It's been a madhouse trucks coming in dropping stuff off. Tractors out there moving, lifting,

carving through the sand, cutting things up, taking out. It's truly quite a feat that they're doing

this. That starts noon today Saturday and tomorrow Sunday. This unseasonal heat is putting an early

end to the ski season at Big Bear Mountain Resort. Tomorrow will be the last day for skiing and

snowboarding at snow summit, as well as for snow valleys coyote creek tube park and snow play area.

By the end of the month, that's next weekend. All snowboarding and skiing slopes at Big Bear Mountain

Resort will close down. In a news release, the resort said this winter has been one of the most

challenging of the last 25 years. And hey, the 405 will have reduced lanes all weekend through

the Sepulveda pass for pavement repairs, only three lanes available between Gettys Center Drive and

Skerval Drive. Coming up, you can experience the sounds of the rainforest right here in LA.

I'm going to take you there more after this break.

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You're listening to the weekend edition of the LA Report. I'm Robert Grova.

What sounds come to mind when you think of the rainforest?

There's a good chance it's the singing of Gibbons, primates with powerful vocalizations that

can travel two miles. I recently visited a sanctuary in Santa Clarita of all places where there's

one of the largest populations of these long-armed primates in the United States.

Less than 10 miles off the 14 freeway down a bumpy dirt road, the Gibbon Conservation Center

takes up about five acres of land speckled with trees. This place is home to 41 Gibbons of five

different species. These tailless primates are known as lesser apes and they have arms that are

one and a half times longer than their legs. I'm here to meet with director Gabriela Scholar

and hopefully hear the Gibbons in concert. Originally from Hungary, Scholar came here as a volunteer

in 2005 and has remained ever since. Now she lives on the site caring for these animals.

When I started working with Gibbons I just felt like they are very emotional. I see them hugging a lot

at their holding hands and I also learned how rare they are. So I just kind of connected with them.

They are very mischievous. What kind of things do they get up to?

I'm actually surprised. They're not trying to grab me or anything but I'm stealing glasses that's

like a normal basic daily things that happens here. I have Kima who likes to scroll through pictures

on my phone and they're very fast. The Gibbons scrolls through the pictures? Yes, yeah.

They are smart. They understand the touchscreen.

Scholar introduces me to a family of critically endangered Gibbons whose numbers have dwindled

to about 1,000 in the wild in places like Vietnam and China. Some have fluffy white cheeks that give

away their name. Right now they're getting a snack of blueberries. So here we have a family of

Northern white Gibbons and the blonde one is Luchia. She's the mother and she's holding while

she's going to be 9 months old and canter is staying away because mom is the boss and mom doesn't

want to share her blueberries. The grounds here are lovingly kept with vintage metal chairs and

benches for hanging out with these primates. Inside the cages there are Gibbons with bushy white

eyebrows, hairdos that flip up over their ears and bulbous throat sacks that give them a couple

extra chins. So how did they all end up here? Scholar explains that the center was founded by her

late teacher, self-taught primatologist Alan Mootnik. When Alan started in like 1976 he had a

small place in Chasvers and he had a couple Gibbons and the neighbors started to complain about

the vocalizations. So he moved here in the 80s. You know he ended up here because there was no one

here and the center needs to kind of have a buffer from neighbors because of their vocalization

can be heard like up to 2 months away. Hunting, poaching and deforestation are hurting Gibbons

populations around the world. Of 20 species only one isn't endangered. The center's mission is

to promote the conservation, study and care of Gibbons through public education and habitat

preservation. These Gibbons eat 6 to 8 times a day to mimic their foraging behaviors in the wild.

So if he had paid in his heart at work in the kitchen surrounded by sketches and paintings of Gibbons

on the walls. So we are preparing what we call the afternoon feeds for the Gibbons. So we've got

apple preparing and then we're going to do some animal eating. Besides eating though there's maybe

one thing that Gibbons seem to love even more. From day one I was just fascinated with their song.

It's just incredible powerful and emotional but the main function of their song to mark their

territory, to tell the neighbors that this is their home.

Sculler shows me how to kickstart the concert. We make a guttural grunting sound that can signal

it's time to sing and then the Gibbons singing is so powerful I feel like the hairs on my arms

are standing up. It's a cacophony you can feel in your chest. People have different feelings about

it. Some people like start peering up when they hear it. Other people you know they want to

join in. They jump up and down. And you can hear the Gibbons sing for yourself. The Gibbon

Conservation Center is open for tours pretty much every weekend. Reservations are required.

We've got the details over at LAS.com. While you're there you can check out a video I did of the Gibbons.

Thanks for listening to the Weekend Edition of the L.A. Report. The Weekend L.A.

Report is hosted by me, Robert Garova, and produced this week by Danielle Martinez.

Our engineer is Sean Cory Campbell. The podcast is edited by Fiona Eng.

Catherine Mailhouse is the director of content development. Join us back here tomorrow.

You can read more at LAS.com and listen live on the LAS app or on the radio at 89.3 FM.

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